Living in After
by FutureCullen22
Summary: Leah goes to visit Emily in the hospital after Emily was attacked. LPOV. Oneshot.


**I'm in the middle of writing the wedding in Breaking Dawn from Edward's POV but I was thinking about Leah tonight and got the sudden urge to write this fic. Please enjoy!**

**Disclaimer: Leah, Emily, that dreadful Sam Uley, and all the other Twilight characters belong to Stephenie Meyer and Stephenie Meyer only!**

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It was almost funny what depression could do to you. _Before_, I could never stand to be still. I was always moving, running, pacing, fidgeting; anything to keep from being still. And now, _After_, being still seemed all I was capable of.

Right now, for instance. I lay lengthwise across my bed, staring at my cracked, white ceiling. I could have probably sketched the surface of my ceiling from memory, that's how well I knew it now. But even sketching required too much movement.

_After_ hadn't only affected my ability to move. Ever since _After_ had happened to me_,_ music seemed dull, food tasted bland, and everything else just started to blur. I would get in bed at night and realize that I couldn't recall any specific thing that had happened that day. Of course, that was probably due to the fact that my days were spent staring at ceilings.

The shrill ring of the phone interrupted my careful ceiling-watching. I felt slightly annoyed by the interruption but the feeling quickly faded; my feelings were mild at best in the era of _After_. I dragged myself from the bed and managed to answer the phone in the middle of the final ring.

"Hello."

"Leah!" I instantly recognized my mom's voice, though it was shrill with anxiety.

"Mom, what's wrong?" I asked, her tense tone awakening my sluggish _After_ version of worry.

"There's been an accident." I froze, my thoughts immediately jumping to _Him_.

"Who?" I gasped, my senses suddenly becoming clearer than they had been since _Before_.

"Emily. I don't know what happened but she was in the woods and then there was a bear or something…"

Though I felt an initial relief that _He_ hadn't been hurt, my worry flared up just as quickly as before. "Emily? How bad is it? Is she gonna be all right? Are you at the hospital? I'm coming down there!"

Without waiting for an answer, I hung up the phone and raced out to the car. My hands shook as I drove and I regretted not getting answers from my mom before I left. A bear attack had she said? Was she going to be okay? Was my best friend _dying_? Already dead?

By the time I pulled into the parking lot of the small Forks hospital, I was in a panic. I hurried into the hospital and found Emily's family and my parents huddled together in an anxious circle in the small hospital lobby. Only Emily's mom, my Aunt Jenny, was missing.

The group turned to look at me, their eyes blood-shot and sad. "Well?" I asked them anxiously. "Is she okay?"

Emily's father sighed. "She'll be fine. But they're only allowing her mother in to see her tonight. You should go home, Leah. And come to see her tomorrow instead."

I blew off the suggestion and asked, "What happened?"

My mother answered this time. "Jared Hatch and Paul Chetco came and found me and told me that Emily had been hurt. They couldn't really give me a clear story but apparently Emily was walking in the woods and was attacked by a bear…" She trailed off with a frown, as if the story didn't fit together right but shook her head and continued. "It mauled her, left gashes down her face, but that's the only damage it did. Emily's lost a lot of blood but they say she'll be all right."

"She'll have scars down her face for the rest of her life though," Emily's sister Natalie added, sounding on the verge of tears. She hugged her baby daughter Claire closer to her.

I was horrified. How could something so terrible happen to my sweet cousin? I tried in vain to convince a nurse to let me stay with Emily but I was rejected; my mother practically had to pull me from the hospital.

I tossed and turned that night in bed. It must have been early morning when I finally fell into a restless sleep. When I woke, I saw much to my alarm that it was already past noon. How could I have slept in at a time like this?

I dressed in a hurry and sped to the hospital, hoping that Chief Swan wasn't out driving on traffic duty today. I rushed into the hospital lobby and asked the nurse at the desk what room Emily was in. The nurse, being the same one I had pestered the night before, gave me a hard look but coolly directed me to the right room.

I took a deep breath at the closed door and knocked.

"Come in," came Emily's voice, sounding weak.

The first thing I saw was Emily's mother. Aunt Jenny smiled tiredly at me and got up from her chair, saying something about getting a bite to eat. As the door clicked shut behind her, I finally gathered the courage to look up at my cousin.

She looked horrible. She had gauze and bandages covering the whole right side of her face. The bandages went down her neck, disappeared under her hospital gown, and reappeared on her right arm.

Despite all the bandages, Emily managed a weak smile at me, wincing slightly. "Thank you for coming, Leah."

I sat down in the chair next to the bed and took her left hand. "Em, are you okay?"

She tried to smile at me again, though it looked pained. "Don't look so worried. I'll be just fine."

"But the whole side of your face-" I broke off, biting my lip to keep back a sudden onslaught of tears.

She closed the one eye visible to me and leaned back tiredly in her bed. "I'll have some scars…that's all." She sounded less confident now.

I swallowed hard. "Your eye is bandaged too…" I couldn't finish; couldn't speak aloud the possibility of my friend losing half her eyesight as well.

She shook her head, reading my thoughts. "The…bear just caught the side of my eye. My sight won't be damaged."

I shook my head in disbelief. "How on earth did you run into a _bear_, Emily? I've never heard of any bears near the rez…" Emily shrugged, looking distant. "Maybe it wandered down from one of the parks?" I wondered aloud. "Well, I'm sure they'll have people hunting it down now."

Emily's eyes widened in alarm. "You don't think they will, will they?" She asked anxiously. "I mean, I'm sure it's far away now; there's really no use," she fretted.

I frowned, studying the worried expression that covered half her face. "What's wrong with you, Emily? Don't you want the bear that _almost killed you_ hunted down? It could hurt more people!"

Her face became carefully composed. "Oh…of course I do. I was just worrying… about the people hunting it." She bit her lip, a sure sign she was lying. But before I could question her, something else occurred to me.

"Em, what were you doing in the woods anyway?" My cousin was hardly the hiking type; the most adventuring she ever did was in the books she read.

She immediately looked uncomfortable. "Just taking a walk…" She paused and then reluctantly finished. "…with Sam."

I straightened up, feeling my emotions automatically folding in upon themselves at the mention of _His_ name. "Oh," I said stiffly. "Still not leaving you alone, huh?" Emily was just as disgusted as I was at _his_ sudden obsession with her but he didn't seem to get the hint. He followed her like some sort of oversized puppy dog.

She nodded, suddenly seemed fascinated with her cuticles. I was trying in vain to force thoughts of _Him_ out of my head when something else occurred to me.

"Hey, if Sam was with you, why was it his friends who went for help?"

"Um…" She picked at her nails, seeming strangely nervous. "Sam…stayed with me…while the others got help."

"Oh…He wasn't at the hospital last night though." I definitely would have remembered _that._

"I guess he went home…Listen, Leah. I really don't want to think about all of this right now. I'm feeling really worn out."

I studied the left side of her face and nodded. "You look exhausted. Did you have a ton of visitors this morning? I bet everyone's worried sick about you."

"Hmm? Oh yea…a few visitors…" She sounded distracted again. I put it off as exhaustion.

"I guess I should be going so you can get some rest." I squeezed her hand. "Call me if you need me, Em."

She smiled tiredly up at me. "Thanks so much for coming, Leah. You're my best friend; you know that right?"

I looked at her curiously. "Yea, Em, of course. You're my best friend too."

Her anxious expression calmed and she leaned back against her pillows. "See you later, Leah."

I got up and headed for the door. But just as I reached for the handle it turned and _He_ walked in.

We stood there, Sam and I, staring at each other in surprise. I felt my expression harden.

"What are you doing here?"

He took a step back, his eyes flickering anxiously to Emily's bed and back to me. "I came to see Emily." He held a bouquet of flowers in his hand.

I remembered with a pang when I had broken my foot last year; he had brought me flowers as well. When I spoke again my voice was rough with unshed tears.

"She doesn't want to see you." He opened his mouth to protest. "_Leave_."

"Leah." Emily's voice came quietly from the bed. "Let him in." I stared at her uncomprehending. She shifted uncomfortably. "I want to see him."

Still in shock, I stood aside and let my ex-boyfriend move to my best friend's bedside, his eyes filled with love and guilt, and hers with a gentle compassion and….something more.

I turned to leave but Emily's voice stopped me.

"Leah," she said, her voice sad, slightly desperate. "You'll come to see me tomorrow won't you?"

"Yes," I answered quietly, without turning. "Of course"

Before she could say anything else, I walked quickly from the room, breaking into a run once I got farther down the hallway. I brushed past the grumpy nurse, ignoring her reprimand. I passed Dr. Cullen, the supposed vampire my whole rez hated, and he looked up from his clipboard watch me pass. Aunt Jenny tried to stop me, looking confused at my grievous expression.

But it wasn't until I was safely in my car that I let my tears flow. The look in Sam's eyes as he gazed at my cousin never failed to wound me. Never had he looked at me with such love in his eyes. Not even when he had promised to someday marry me. The love he felt for Emily was unimaginable.

But that wasn't what had hurt the most. What had pained me was to see the answering love in Emily's expression. It was tentative and reluctant but real all the same. Not only had _After_ taken away the one person I loved most in the world, but it had taken away my best friend as well.

**Sorry if this sucked, I wrote it at 4am. But I hoped you liked it nonetheless!!!!**

**Thanks for reading! Remember to review!!!!**

**Your dedicated fanfic writer,**

**FutureCullen22**


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